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Dead Macbook Pro hard drive

So here is the situation. I am a PC nerd my neighbor owns a macbook. She, lets call it "spilled" "something" on it and now it is dead. Battery is charging, power supply works, just dead Mac.

My question is.. can the hard drive from Macbook Pro be connected to a windows 10 PC to read photo, music, video and media files to save? An external drive wouldn't work because the Macbook it totally dead. (no power no post)

Posted on Jul 27, 2021 3:36 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 27, 2021 4:27 PM

can the hard drive from Macbook Pro be connected to a windows 10 PC to read photo, music, video and media files to save?


Yes, if physically removed from the dead Mac. And therein lies the rub: different storage devices in different MacBook Pro sub-models.


Removing solely depends on a sub-model, which we do not know at this point.


The last MacBook Pros that had easily extracted mechanical hard drives were the Mid-2012 models. The drive can be removed and connected to another computer for data recovery by putting it in a USB external drive enclosure, or with on of these:


https://eshop.macsales.com/item/NewerTech/U3NV2SPATA/


As the computer is dead, you wil have to get its sub-model from the serial number and entering it into this Apple support page:


Check Your Service and Support Coverage - Apple Support


It will return something like this:



For Macs without quick-detach (QD) batteries, the serial number is in painfully tiny print on the bottom of the case near the hinge:



For "silver-key" MacBook Pros with the QD battery, the serial number is inside the battery bay.


With the sub-model we can see what removal and recovery options, if any, are available.

2 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 27, 2021 4:27 PM in response to gbalkam

can the hard drive from Macbook Pro be connected to a windows 10 PC to read photo, music, video and media files to save?


Yes, if physically removed from the dead Mac. And therein lies the rub: different storage devices in different MacBook Pro sub-models.


Removing solely depends on a sub-model, which we do not know at this point.


The last MacBook Pros that had easily extracted mechanical hard drives were the Mid-2012 models. The drive can be removed and connected to another computer for data recovery by putting it in a USB external drive enclosure, or with on of these:


https://eshop.macsales.com/item/NewerTech/U3NV2SPATA/


As the computer is dead, you wil have to get its sub-model from the serial number and entering it into this Apple support page:


Check Your Service and Support Coverage - Apple Support


It will return something like this:



For Macs without quick-detach (QD) batteries, the serial number is in painfully tiny print on the bottom of the case near the hinge:



For "silver-key" MacBook Pros with the QD battery, the serial number is inside the battery bay.


With the sub-model we can see what removal and recovery options, if any, are available.

Dead Macbook Pro hard drive

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